Politicians run for office despite charges

LUCKNOW (AP):

Of the dozens of criminal charges Atiq Ahmed faces, the one blaming him for the murder of a political rival tops the list. But that isn't stopping the state lawmaker from running for a seat in India's Parliament.

More than 1,200 candidates running for 545 seats in the national election face criminal charges including rape, kidnapping, extortion and murder, according to a tally by the Association for Democratic Reform.

"Criminalisation of politics is a bad trend. Earlier politicians used criminals. Now, the criminals themselves have entered politics," said Rituraj Sharma, a 21-year-old first-time voter.

In much of India, violence and politics go hand in hand. Political parties use local strongmen to intimidate political rivals. Ahmed, who denies all the charges and calls them politically motivated, is just one of hundreds of Indian politicians who activists say operate at the crossroads of crime and politics.

Progress stifled

While not unique to India, it stifles progress for the country of 1.2 billion people to have a political class unable, or unwilling, to root out criminals and keeping out idealistic aspirants.

Indian law only bars a person from running for political office once they have been convicted by a court and that can take years, even decades, as cases wind their way through woefully overburdened courts.

Fearing violence because of the candidates' backgrounds, the state election commission has declared 10 of the 15 constituencies "red constituencies" and will take extraordinary measures to ensure that the vote is peaceful, said Uttar Pradesh's chief electoral officer, Umesh Sinha.

Hundreds of thousands of troops and police are already spread out across India to provide security for the massive election where some 814 million voters are registered. The voting is taking place in phases, with the final phase next Monday and results due on May 16.

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